Steve doesn't care if Bucky's crushing his hand, if it's hard enough to hurt. He holds on, squeezing back as much as he can even though he doesn't know if Bucky can feel it. Doesn't know if Bucky can feel anything at all.

"I'm sorry," he blurts out suddenly, and it's everything he didn't want to do and can't stop himself from saying. "I didn't know what to -- you were gone, you were gone and they said they could bring you back and I didn't think about it and we can -- we can fix it. We can. Send you back." Kill you again, he doesn't say, can't say, couldn't bring himself to say if he wanted to. "I'm sorry, I didn't know what to do, I didn't -- I didn't think."